When the LV Aces walked into the Gateway Centre at College Park, all eyes were on a marquee showdown. Two MVP candidates, A’ja Wilson and Allisha Gray, collided in front of 3,326 fans. But while it was a battle for playoff positioning with the red-hot Aces chasing the No. 2 seed, in reality, it wasn’t the score or the stars who stole the show… it was the Atlanta crowd who stunned Rhyne Howard and Co.!The LV opened up the third quarter with a 40-42 scoreline, with Atlanta in the lead. However, as the game progressed, A’ja and her teammates went on a run to take control of a tightly contested game, limiting the opponent to 6 points. As the Aces accumulated 23 points, surprisingly they also drew loud cheers from fans inside Atlanta’s arena. Obviously, the Dream’s players didn’t like it, but it was Howard who came forward to voice her frustrations.“This is a challenge… We rely on our fans and when they pick and choose who they want to cheer for and make it feel like an away game for us and a home game for the other team, it’s easy to go on a run like that, especially with playoffs coming up,” Howard shared in the post-game press conference. 

Can you blame her? From that moment, the Dream’s imbalance in the game was clear until they lost to the Aces. But it wasn’t just the cheers. When Wilson was at the free throw line looking to seal the win, fans started chanting MVP too. No doubt, she deserved it for scoring eight consecutive points, including back-to-back 3-pointers in the third-quarter run to help the Aces in their 15-0 stretch, taking the score to 61-48 going into the fourth quarter.

By the end of the day, she had 34 points with 10 rebounds to help the team grab their 12th consecutive win. Now, she’s got the second-most—35 career games scoring at least 30 points—and she’s just 19 games away from taking over Diana Taurasi, who tops the list.

For context, Wilson’s latest outburst also pushed her further into the 2025 MVP race. According to recent league stat trackers, she’s averaging over 23 points per game and sits atop the WNBA in Player Efficiency Rating. While Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier remain in the mix, many analysts now call Wilson the clear frontrunner, especially after the Aces’ historic 12-game streak.

So yes, they cheered for A’ja, but Howard still didn’t spare them. “You want to see Gamecocks, we have Gamecocks on our roster. The last game we had ‘MVP’ chants for one of our players… Don’t get here and switch up because of one player. And yes, we do make mistakes, but it’s easy to lose momentum when you have other people cheering against you,” she added.

By Gamecocks, she meant Allisha Gray, who scored 15 points in today’s loss. And yes, she’s in MVP talks too, having the best season of her career so far in 2025. She’s earned WNBA Eastern Conference Player of the Month in May and June and is also the first Dream player to win back-to-back monthly honors.

While the Dream weren’t able to grab a win today, Gray set a Dream franchise record for the most double-digit games (37th) with 140 games played. Meanwhile, she broke the last record of 36 set by Howard in 2023. So yes, Howard does make sense… but not really to the fans!

Fans gotta point though!

The social media community didn’t waste a moment and dived right into the comment section to reply to Howard’s intriguing response during the press conference. “Rhyne don’t be like this,” penned a user on X. It hurts the fans… it really does. The outpouring by fans wasn’t random. As Georgia borders South Carolina, Wilson’s alma mater, it seems many in attendance were her longtime fans.

“Yea I’m sorry lil sis THAT’S A’JA WILSON,” penned another user. A’ja spent four years from 2014 to 2018 under HC Dawn Staley while playing for USC. During that time, she helped the team achieve unprecedented success, including their first-ever NCAA championship title in 2017. She even swept nearly every major award, from the Wooden Award and Naismith Trophy to SEC Player of the Year.

And by the time she left, she was the all-time program leader in scoring with 2,389 points—and yes, she even has an actual statue. “It’s still kind of captivating that I have an actual statue, and it’s like a landmark. People are like, ‘Oh, we’ll just meet up at the statue.’ It’s pretty cool to be a landmark!” she shared in her 2024 book Dear Black Girls: How to Be True to You. But SC is more than just basketball for A’ja.

“Honestly since Atl isn’t too far from SC, a lot of Gamecock fans probably went to the game to cheer A’ja on. Gamecock Nation shows up and shows out. I’m sure they cheered for the other Gamecock players too,” penned another user. For Wilson, SC had always been a home and a glue that holds her together.

“They raised me… Columbia has raised me. So many people have been a part of the village to help raise me. When it comes to me and my upbringing, I am Columbia. And I will always stand by that,” she shared with NBC Sports in 2023. She grew up in Hopkins, South Carolina, nearly 20 minutes outside Columbia, the city whose slogan is “smiling faces, beautiful place.”

And those faces for her were her parents, grandparents, godparents, aunts, uncles, and friends who feel just as close as family to Wilson. That’s why she penned, “No matter how many license plates I change, no matter how many driver’s licenses I may have, I’m a South Carolinian through and through, and the 803 has my heart,” in her 2024 book.

So that’s why fans can’t help but cheer for her. “This is why you can’t take WNBA players seriously… crap like this! So A’ja Wilson is in town. South Carolina is her home state. People love her from there. They are coming to see her play in your bandaid box arena. And you are crying cause people came to see her? It’s embarrassing for real. You can’t take this shit seriously at all. BOO FUCKING HOO HOO. Go win the game and stop whining. There is always SOMETHING with WNBA players to complain about. Now, let’s complain about the fans cheering for the other team. Remember, you play in a 4,000-seat building FOR A REASON! No one cares about your team. You could NOT sell out a closet… 3,326 fans showed up. IT PROVES YOU HAVE NO FANS!” penned another user. For SC fans, from landmark statues to retired jerseys and her speeches, everything reminds them of Wilson as a living legend. But come on, this isn’t the first time a home crowd started cheering for the opponent team.

This has been a common sight in the W nowadays, especially ever since the arrival of big names like Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers. In fact, the W mostly relies on star names for sell out arenas. Many teams have even shift their games to bigger arenas to welcome the fans that follow.

“Rhyne Howard, no shade, but if Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever had rolled into Atlanta, trust me… the crowd would’ve made you feel way worse. I get it; you want your fans loud for you, but let’s be real… you know what it is. BTW, I love watching you play. You have a smooth game,” penned another user.

Well, the Dream themselves are no strangers to this scenario. Earlier this season, they moved their season opener vs Indy from Gateway Centre to State Farm Arena, which had nearly 17,000 seats. And they aren’t the only one making such moves. Despite CC being limited to just 13 games this season, the Mystics, Sky, Aces, Wings, and Sun were among those teams that shifted. But honestly, we get what Howard’s trying to say, as Wilson already shared in her book: “You want to try to please all the fans and all the people, and you want to try to prove your haters wrong, and your doubters, and you want to be this person for them every day.” But do fans get it, though?